Cultivate Sharing

Let’s face it, it’s not always easy in the city to find enough space to grow an accessible and productive vegetable garden. Over the past few years, Les Urbainculteurs has succeeded in setting up various projects throughout Quebec City. The organization is greening the city by installing vegetable gardens in geotextile pots and containers in various locations, both on rooftops and on the ground. These urban vegetable gardens reach out to different types of clientele, with the possibility of being accompanied by a horticulturist who will share his or her knowledge throughout the season. Most of the harvest is donated to food security organizations.

More Than Just a Vegetable Garden

Beyond the vegetables grown in these gardens, there are the encounters, the learning and the pride of giving to others. The vegetable garden at one of Quebec City’s theaters is a fine example of a partnership that both greens up a concrete space with useful crops and provides weekly education. Volunteers have been coming twice a week to maintain, harvest and deliver the crops to an organization in need for over a decade. From the very first weeks, these volunteers get involved in planting the vegetable garden.

With the help of the Urbainculteurs team, these community-minded individuals transform this vegetable garden, made of geotextile pots and tubs, into a lush, productive space. An irrigation system ensures hassle-free cultivation, and our team works with volunteers to pass on their knowledge on a variety of subjects: crop protection, staking, fertilization, the right harvesting stages and much more. In short, it’s through this sharing that hundreds of kilos of vegetables are given away every year, and dozens of people benefit from horticultural knowledge they can transfer to their own gardens.

Involving the Little Ones

Several vegetable gardens have also been set up in childcare centers. The planters used are installed at children’s height to encourage their participation in the upkeep. From an early age, these children can sow, watch and taste the vegetables they grow. And what can we say about the wonder in their eyes when they harvest a beautiful carrot, or the pleasure of biting into a freshly picked snow pea? What’s more, some day-care centers share part of their harvest with families in the form of a mini-market.

Sharing Know-How

Some projects also offer an intergenerational component, where grandparents and grandchildren get their hands dirty together. Other companies invest in an urban vegetable garden where staff are invited to take part in every stage of the garden’s creation. In response to demand, and to further support staff, a new formula has recently been introduced where, over lunchtime, short training and question-and-answer sessions are offered by the Urbainculteurs team, once again with the aim of sharing know-how and enabling interested parties to learn and transfer their acquired knowledge to their own gardens.

As you’ve seen, urban agriculture has enormous community and environmental benefits, and hopefully contributes in its own way to increasing food security and accessibility to fresh, healthy, local food to improve our living environments. At least, that’s what Les Urbainculteurs believes, and has been doing since 2009.